The Gift That God Doesn't Want - Daughters of the Creator

So if you are offering your gift at the altar and there remember that your brother has something against you, leave your gift there before the altar and go. First be reconciled to your brother, and then come and offer your gift.

Matthew 5:23-24

Many people don’t understand how particular God is about receiving gifts from His people. He doesn’t accept any thing we want to give to Him. If we are giving because of pressure from someone making us feel guilty, just keep it. If we are ungrateful, just keep it. If we know that someone is angry with us, it’s time to put the gift down and go be reconciled.

We should be able to relate to how God is about gifts. What if someone offered to give you a luscious chocolate cake made from scratch, but they served it to you on the upside down lid of a maggot-covered garbage can? Would you still eat it? Of course not. In fact, you would offended that they would even approach you that way.

When our hearts aren’t right before God, it doesn’t matter the amount of our gift to Him—it’s unacceptable. He wants us to give out of appreciative hearts and attitudes. Anything less is the garbage can lid mentality. We can do better in our giving by examining our hearts and motivations before we give. We can pray and ask God to reveal to us the truth of what we are about to give to Him.

God sees our hearts regardless of what we look like on the outside or what we put in the offering plate. It’s much better to deal with our hearts now than to wait until the judgment seat of Christ and see how much we’ve lost because God refused our gift. In Genesis 4, Cain brought an unacceptable gift to God, and he was refused. We don’t want to be like Cain. We want our gifts to be received by God and blessed by God.